Capturing a larger-than-life personality like Freddie Mercury on celluloid

Freddie Mercury was the rock star: a maverick talent with the voice of a Michael Jackson and the spirit of a Tina Turner. His flamboyance triggered the most sublime rock and roll theatre. His personal life was complex, and widely written about and discussed, yet no one really knew the real story. He had a zany sense of style, and when he crooned and grooved, the audience was often transported to a musical stratosphere few knew existed. The guy was more than a pop icon; he was a deity.

Playing such characters on screen can be gruelling. You are constantly under the shadow of a larger-than-life character whose existence was so dramatically tumultuous that no amount of stellar acting talent suffices. Yet, Rami Malek, much like Mercury’s music, soars in Bohemian Rhapsody, Bryan Singer’s film on Queen and its frontman’s rise to global stardom.

Charismatic and irresistibly charming, Malek brings to life Mercury in the most surreal manner, brilliantly fusing arduous beginnings at home — here was an Indian-origin Parsi man born in Zanzibar trying to make it as a singer in London — with the on-stage bravado that became Mercury’s signature. The experience is enhanced by some excellent dental prosthetics. Mercury’s legendary overbite — though slightly exaggerated — looks unbelievably real on Malek; the impersonation gets even better when Mercury jets into the 1980s. As the mullet goes and the moustache appears, Malek comes into his own.

It’s a shame that the film itself dazzles only sporadically. Initially, the story seems too good to be true: Malek’s Mercury arrives on the scene supremely confident of his ability, and all it takes is a couple of euphonious lines in a car park for him to go from social misfit to all-conquering music genius. And then before you know it, you realise that Bohemian Rhapsody comes with all the trappings of a typical rock-star film: heady success followed by alcohol- and drug-fuelled parties, awkward sexual choices, blossoming friendships with the wrong people, clashes among band members, the inevitable break-up — all of it topped off by the terrible loneliness of one of the world’s most celebrated pop stars.

Despite Singer’s attempts at portraying Mercury as a non-conformist, not to mention the character’s own brags — “I won’t compromise my vision any longer” and “We don’t follow formulas” — the life that Mercury lived, both musically and otherwise, was nothing but a cliché.

Then there is the small matter of distorting facts. Mercury is shown as confessing to have contracted AIDS to his band mates as early as 1985; his partner, Jim Hutton, however, acknowledged several years later that the singer did not know of the disease till April 1987. Mercury’s relationship with Hutton, in fact, is conveniently aligned to ensure that this warped narrative has a happy ending.

Moreover, the despair that Mercury must have endured when told about his medical condition barely comes through. And his family, with whom he shared a difficult relationship, makes only cursory appearances; all the complexities are soft-pedalled. There is no mention of Jackson, either, with whom Mercury was believed to have been collaborating in the mid-1980s.

That is not to say that there are no enjoyable moments here. The film, when not steered by Malek’s magnetism, falls back on the rip-roaring melodies that made Queen such a rage. The Live Aid concert of 1985, which is where the film starts and ends, is a Queen tribute like no other. Singer recreates roughly 15 minutes from the gig at Wembley Stadium, with thousands clapping and swaying in unison to the tunes of “Radio Ga Ga”, “Hammer to Fall” and “We are the Champions”.

So how does a film with an iconic soundtrack and a superb lead performance fall short? By glossing over uncomfortable facts and playing it too safe. Mercury and Queen may never have quite developed a liking for set formulas, but the makers of Bohemian Rhapsody have definitely followed one here. And it doesn’t really work.